IN THIS VIDEO:
A video interview with Matthew Sweetwood, President of Unique Photo, Matthew offers words of inspiration and talks about some of his favorite photographers, who serve as inspiration.

Vickie: This has been so much fun today, Matthew. I want to leave on an inspirational note. I want to ask you what is your favorite photographer, maybe an inspirational quote you could share. Something that inspires you about photography.

Matthew: Okay. Here’s what I’m going to say. For me, since we have in our university, we have had a set, I don’t want to say everyone, we’ve had a large amount of very well known photographers who have come through out facility. For me to pick one, it sort of like what’s your favorite food or what’s your favorite … I don’t know. For me it depends on the kind of photography, like I have my favorites.

I think maybe what I’ll do is I’ll mention a few of them. I’ll just say it sort of like this, who would I want to learn from? If I were an event photographer, I think I’d want to learn from Hanson Fong. There’s nobody better at posing, there’s no better instructor than him. He’s a Canon explorer of light. For me, he’s the guy that really communicates that kind of thing well.

Vickie: What’s the last name again?

Matthew: Hanson Fong. He’s from Canon. If I wanted to talk about Americana photography, sort of capturing the moment, we’ve had a photographer in here. He was a former White House photographer. His name is Chris Usher. He was very inspiring for me, because way back when we had him in, the little light bulb went off in my head when I watched his photography. I realized that not every image had a tack sharp. I’m a very mathematical kind of person so everything needs to be perfectly clear and focus. He had a lot of images which had motion and blur. My little brain, the little light bulb went off in there. Oh. Wow. Not everything has to be tack sharp. He really is very, very inspiring. We’ve had a Art Wolfe in here. He’s considered one of the best. His images are breath taking. I can just go on and on. The photographers, we’ve had Gregory Heisler in here, who some considered the greatest portrait photographer in the last whatever number of years. My personal friend Robert Farber, his images are breath taking. I can just go on and on in naming photographers.

Vickie: Sure. I bet, but it’s great to see that you have photographers that inspire you.

Matthew: Absolutely. I see them on the seminars and you want to be inspired. You go in there not only to learn how to click the dials. You see these photographers and you learn how to become inspired. I’ll sort of end because you asked for my inspirational quote. For me, I think it’s not necessarily about photography, but it’s about life in general. It’s for business people. All business people really need to think like this.

My motto, my slogan is how badly do you want it? If you think about that, if you want something bad enough, you can make it happen. You want your business to succeed? Just keep asking yourself, how badly do you want it? How badly do you want it? That to me is my motivation. When I look at something and I say, “I need to get from here to there.” I say to myself, “How badly do you want it?” I do it in physical fitness, I do it in everywhere. To me I drive myself like that and driven people are the ones that are most successful.

Vickie: That’s great. I couldn’t have thought of someone more driven than you, Matthew Sweetwood, and I thank you so much today for today’s interview.

Matthew: Thank you, Vickie. It’s a pleasure being here. I look forward to our next one.

Vickie: Thank you very much. You can look for this podcast on the smarter online marketing podcast, it’s an episode that’s coming up shortly. The video will also be available on YouTube on my channel say wow marketing. Okay. If there’s any questions, post your comments below this video or email me at vickie, V-I-C-K-I-E @saywowmarketing.com. How can they contact you, Matthew?

Matthew: I’m available at Twitter at @msweetwood. You can reach me, I’ll give you my email. I love hearing from people out there. I’m Matt, M-A-T-T @uniquephoto.com. So Twitter really is good @msweetwood or matt@uniquephoto.com. Also, a lot of this content, we’re going to be obviously social media this content. You will be able to find that on my Twitter, you’ll find that on Unique Photo’s twitter, on our Facebook and so on. We’re going to really promote this lovely interview out there.

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